The
Birds was Alfred Hitchcock's follow-up to the critical
and box office knockout he created in Psycho.
After such a huge victory, he needed some time to come up with his
next effort, one that would live up to the expectations brought on
by its wildly successful predecessor. Though it is nearly impossible
to equal the achievements of a ground-breaking film like
Psycho, The
Birds is by all means one of the best technical efforts
of his career. For the most part, time has been kind to
The Birds, and thirty-seven
years later, it's still an effective dramatic thriller.

The movie is based on a short story of the same name by Daphne
DuMaurier, whose novel Rebecca
became Hitchcock's first American film. One of the great things
about The Birds is the nice
dramatic arc of the story. When we are first introduced to the
characters, it's in a cutesy sort of way. Merry prankster Melanie
Daniels (Tippi Hedren) is shopping for some birds in a downtown San
Francisco pet shop, when she meets stuffy attorney Mitch Brenner
(Rob Taylor). When he catches Melanie in the middle of one of her
tricks, she uses her considerable meddlesome skills to track him
down in Bodega Bay to surprise him with a gift of two lovebirds.

Once on the island, the story gradually and skillfully unfolds into
the kind of suspense and terror that audiences have come to expect
from Alfred Hitchcock. While secretly delivering the birds to
Mitch's home, Melanie is attacked by a seagull. As the weekend
presses on, the attacks on the town grow in frequency, and the
number of birds swells to biblical proportions. The townspeople grow
suspicious of Melanie, since the attacks coincide with her arrival
in town. As the movie progresses toward its disastrous ending,
tempers flare and tensions rise as everyone tries to understand why
the birds have taken their anger out on their idyllic town.

One interesting side note - for all the seagulls, crows, black
birds and finches on the set, there is not one drop of bird poop
throughout the entire movie. Not one! Truth be told, it's better
that way. I suppose it's hard to concentrate on saving your own neck
when you're worrying about being a moving target for a bunch of
angry birds with chips on their shoulders. By the way, do birds even
have shoulders?

The amount of detail (bird poop aside) put into
The Birds is astonishing.
Hitchcock used master craftsman Albert Whitlock to create some
amazing matte paintings, that are seamlessly blended into shots of
Bodega Bay and sets on the back lot of Universal Studios. Instead of
using blue-screen effect shots for some of the more difficult to
film scenes, the filmmakers used a sophisticated, more realistic
looking sulfur-screen effect. This process was pioneered early on by
Disney and dispensed with the fuzzy-edged look the blue-screen
technique created. At times, it really is hard to tell which
sequences are effect shots and which are the real deal.

The Birds is one of two horror
films (The Exorcist being the
other) that made real headway with the use of noise and natural
sounds to create a very specific mood on film. Hitchcock chose to
forego the usual instrumental score and instead went with the use of
emerging keyboard technology to create a soundtrack of bird calls,
cries, and wing-flapping that really get under the viewer's skin.
The effects track is very much tied into the movie in a way that
musical scores sometimes aren't. The noises crescendo, dip and
startle in the same manner a musical soundtrack would, without
creating a piece separate from the movie itself for the audience to
focus on.

The only part of the movie that doesn't really stand the test of
time is some of the bird effect shots. The
Birds was made, of course, long before the advent of CGI
effects. Sure, they were good at the time, but sometimes it really
does look like mechanical birds on wires, particularly in the
birthday party scene. Sometimes the effects work, sometimes they
don't. Even when they fail, they're still entertaining in a
charming, goofy sort of way.

On DVD, The Birds looks very
good. This is obviously a brand new transfer because it looks
gorgeous. The anamorphic widescreen transfer is striking,
particularly when you consider the age of the movie. The colors are
intentionally muted to reflect the foggy atmosphere of the Bay area,
yet the colors are all distinct from each other without a lot of
noticeable bleed. Blacks are solid with a lot of detail. There is a
little bit of edge enhancement, but nothing that will divert your
attention. The mono soundtrack is also good, but the lack of a new
Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is somewhat of a disappointment. Considering
what an asset the movie's use of sound is, a new treatment would
have served to increase that mood and provide even more effect. How
frightening it would be to hear birds coming at you from all around!
Nonetheless, the sound provided is clear and adequate.

There are a number of features included on this disc. The
documentary, All About The Birds
is one of the more thorough and entertaining I've seen on a DVD
special edition. Virtually all aspects of the movie, from
pre-production to release, are covered in a fair amount of detail.
Universal included interviews with many of the cast and crew members
with the documentary to provide even more insight into the
production of the movie. On the other hand, the original ending and
deleted scene are a bit of a let down. The actual footage of the
deleted scene no longer exists, so the scene is played out using
script excerpts and pictures from the set. The original ending was
never actually filmed, because it would have been too expensive and
time consuming. Universal included the scripted scene and storyboard
artwork to give you an idea of what it would have looked like had it
been filmed. There are also a couple of newsreels and the usual
amusing Hitchcock theatrical trailer for the movie. Production
photographs and notes, bios, and a Universal web link (yippy!) round
out the disc.

Goofy mechanical birds aside, The Birds
is still a very good film, and a milestone in technical filmmaking.
Throw into that some informative, entertaining extras, a great
looking picture and an affordable price, and you've got another
great disc from Universal. This disc comes highly recommended.